The wind brushed past his face as he hurried through the snow, pushing his way through foot after foot, like swimming in frozen water. The way Sakura saw it, he was crying helpless through the winter storm, because there was no one waiting – there was nothing but the mindless haze of depression and the senseless waiting that seemed to happen day in and out.

"Sasuke?!" He screamed into the midday flurries. The snow before them turned everything into smoke, like looking at the world through a silk screen. The others held back, not quite certain enough to run after the hysterical blonde.

The snow seemed to continue forever, teeming at the peaks of the mountains. There was nowhere to go but forward at this point, for their tracks had been lost along with their sense of direction. Naruto was even more lost than the others though, running through a maze deep in his soul. It felt like somewhere inside of him, there were hands grabbing at his heart, pulling him forward, squeezing the life out of him if he did not continue. They were threatening him with death, with the promise that it would come if…

Please let Sasuke be waiting for him somewhere. Please, he pleaded with the hands, don't be pulling me towards his mangled body.

And then he stopped.

The person in front of him seemed to draw all the air from the world. It gathered the smoke of the world around them, the burning fires of his hatred and anguish, and wiped it away. The hands squeezed harder and faster and stronger than before but then left when the figure became clear, like a phoenix rising from the ashes.

And Naruto cried. Because he looked fragile and he looked sick. He looked like death was somewhere riding on his coattails, clinging to his shoulders like a hitchhiker on the roadside. He looked like love in its purest form and like a curse that the world bore. He looked like regret and longing for words to have been said earlier. So, so much earlier. The world beneath him was shattering and they were falling at a mind bending pace. So smooth. So real.

"You weren't supposed to come looking." He said in a frigid voice, even more so than in years previous.

But there, standing before Naruto, was the spectacle of his imagination. This was the moment that he'd had dreams about – standing before Sasuke as he welcomed him home. But this…was far from ideal to say the least. There was no remorse to be seen, decking the raven haired boys face. There was only the look of someone who'd had one more than one too many sleepless nights. That had stayed awake thinking to themselves and wondering…plotting…missing the very person that was standing in front of him but that would never know – that had been the plan all along.

There were circles like bruises around his eyes and a sharp angle to his jaw that had always been there but was somehow even more pronounced now than before. He was a man now – a beautiful one. And little did Naruto know, but he had changed as well. And Sasuke, who stood speechless and seemingly angry, was enthralled. There was a willful presence to the blonde that shook the mountains. There was a strength to his chakra that the other had been able to sense from the village itself. He was just as different, if not more so. But somehow, the elder of the two seemed to overlook the change that had happened over the few months. The equally as sleepless eyes. The darkening and thickening of the other's chakra till it was like molasses, running through his body.

"I had to…" Naruto whispered, still letting tears fall freely down his cheeks.

"That is a strong word."

"Strong bonds call for strong words."

And in that moment, it seemed that the mist of snow began to clear, the sky becoming vacant and the team could make out the full shape of the Uchiha that stood before them. His hair was long – too long. And he was just a thin as one would have expected, nothing but a torn up hakama hanging around his boney hips. There had been months spent out here, living in this mountain – that was becoming obvious.

Sasuke stood awestruck by the words that the other spoke. Despite the time – despite leaving him so desperately alone, he still clung to the word "bond". Was that what described this feeling, burning deeply in his heart? Was this what it felt like to miss someone so terribly much and then to be reunited with them again, knowing only that you will lose your freedom, the only ounce of respect that you have left for yourself and that others have left for you. No – no one had respect for him anymore – he had no respect for himself, so why would they? He was the frigid youth that they all detested. And Naruto only served to remind him of the horrible things that people could do to a person. And even then, there were things that they couldn't see. Things that they didn't hear.

"You're coming back with us, right?"

The words stung and Sasuke had to look away to keep from crying himself. He didn't long for this fate – he didn't long for the confines of a village, for the ANBU that would be following him for his lifetime, for the glaring daggers that people would wear, hanging from around their necks. He wanted to remain dead. He wanted to be off the map. But there was something in those glowing blue eyes that begged and pleaded with him. That turned his stomach and made him reconsider his life like he had never thought of it before. He was the only reason left to return – no he wasn't, but he was the best one by far.

He too cried then, just as Naruto had stopped. The overwhelming feeling of the past few months came rushing towards him – his own forged death and what he had hoped for it to accomplish. But that had not worked. He had hoped for a break as clean as the one of his dreams, but that was not the reality of this. As the snow had cleared, he could now see the circles like his own, reflected in the crystal blue eyes of the blonde boy. No, he was a man. Broken and torn, but he was a man now, just as Sasuke was. His tears remained silent though because unlike the other, there were things that he wasn't willing to say just yet. There had been a time, not too long ago, that he had said the words to himself – something he had promised never to feel. It took courage, and they tasted weird on his tongue and made his stomach churn.

Bonds. Yes bonds were important, but they were the cause of all this pain. They were the cause of the scars on his heart – not his brother or his family or the people he had met throughout his teenage years. It was the bonds that had stuck, the bonds that had always been there and the person that had searched for him tirelessly for so many years.

Snow crushed under Naruto's foot as he took a single step forward, testing the waters delicately. Sasuke took a hand to his face, wiping away the tears that had pooled on his cheeks. And then they were there, like the arms of a brother or a parent or a partner, there were arms wrapped around him, so soothingly warm and secure.

"You are different, you know?" Naruto pulled back, keeping his hands and pressure on Sasuke's shoulders. He looked at him in the eyes, his own tears pooling at the edge of his eyes. "But still there. Still Sasuke." The blonde boy smiled then, from ear to ear, the first real smile that either Sakura or Kakashi had seen in a long time – it seemed like years. Perhaps it had been, but the sadness had left his face, like he was breathing the same air as the rest of the world again.

The world was still and the snow had stopped. The fellow ninja stood and watched as the powerful red chakra seemed to envelop the dying blue one. Noticing this, Sakura stepped forwards, her foot crunching in the snow.

"Sasuke…" She muttered, still not entirely sure if he was real. But just as sure as she wasn't, she knew that he needed some serious sort of help for his chakra to be so depleted. She moved forwards more, grabbing his hand and standing beside Naruto, feeling for his warmth. But there was none – he was cold like stone – like touching a statue.

"We need to get him back to the village." Kakashi said from behind them.

Sasuke pulled his hand towards himself, attempting to pull it from Sakura's grasp. He bit his lip, trying and failing to fend off tears somehow, with such weak will as he had. But Sakura, with newfound strength in the years prior, held on, keeping his in place. The boy looked up towards the mountain cave, towards the place he had spent so long living, and then back towards the eyes of his comrades. His friends, if they even would allow him to call them that anymore.

"What is waiting for me there?" he whispered, staring at the ground. "What is waiting for me if not predators…and I am the prey. Not even safe in my home."

"Ya." Naruto's hand began to tremble on Sasuke's shoulder. "Ya, you are right. They hated you for what you did. But you know what? When we found out you were dead, they all mourned for you. And if you said those words you just said to me…"

"I meant my prison."

"No, Sasuke, you meant what you said. Konoha is all of our homes, but it hasn't felt like home in years. Not without you."

Looking as close in their eyes as they were, standing mere inches from one another, Sasuke felt like he could see the memories swimming in Naruto's eyes – the sadness, the loneliness, the pain. But there was something that he didn't see, swimming alongside them – something that Naruto didn't even know himself. But Sakura knew it, Kakashi too. And when Sasuke sighed in resignation, falling to his knees in a heap in the snow, Sakura held tightly to his hand because it had been in his eyes too.

There has been a sickly sad, longing gaze that they two young men had held for far too long and it reminded Sakura and Kakashi alike just how many years it had been. The boy on his knees refused to show his weakness, but Naruto fell too eventually, grabbing the other into his arms, holding the limp, nearly lifeless body to his own. He looked up at Sakura, pleading with his eyes.

"Do you think there is time?" He wondered aloud, asking for Sakura, pleading for her healing hands. But the girl, if she was being honest was just as scared as the blonde boy was because there was barely anything left in his arms to hold onto. Just a cold and dying chakra that didn't seem to want to be saved.

"I can do my best." She responded, kneeling too in the snow. Naruto lay down Sasuke's body, watching his chest rise and fall at a terrifying rate. The glow of Sakura's hands was laid over Sasuke's chest, blocking his view but perhaps that was for the best, he thought.

Eventually, Sakura pulled back, resting her hands on her knees, not before wiping her brow of sweat.

"This is the best I can do for him now." She looked up at Naruto, who sat in the snow across from her. He nodded his head the best he could, still looking down at Sasuke's nearly lifeless body. "We have to get him back to the village as soon as possible, Naruto."

And he would do that, he thought. He would get Sasuke to his family, to his home, so that he could get the help that he needed. Taking him into his arms once again, Naruto stood, feeling for the first time, Sasuke's fragility in its full Valor.

He would take him home.

He would fix this.